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*preroll music*

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Herald: And welcome to this beautiful evening

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The next talk is very interesting talk.

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It's actually.. will go to.. tackle some more..

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quality.. quantity, the army.

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Actually using an army to have some balance

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in a way.

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Not...

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Yeah, I can actually just say:
What can an army do if the army

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was effectively (?) put into action,
let's say.

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So.

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Mr. Constant Dullaart will introduce
the talk for us today.

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And please welcome him
with a warm applause.

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*applause*

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constantdull: First of all, thank you very much
for joining.

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It's a great privilege

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and an honour to speak in this context
of the great CCC.

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I'm generally more nervous than
I would normally be.

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So, anyway, forgive me if I stutter
or something, but hopefully I'm not,

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because I drank some beer.

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So, also.. so, I built an army.

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This much is true.

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And it's nice because we're talking
about Crypto Wars and about losing the war,

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and we're talking about all those other
kinds of stuff.

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We have all these war analogies,
so I thought it's also kind of fitting

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to present an army to you.

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But I will actually explain to you

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how I got there.

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So some people might know me
from works like these,

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which is.. which doesn't have sound.

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Ahm.. *laughing*

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I think it did originally.

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But anyway, this is the Revolving Internet.

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I made it in 2010.

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So, making jokes of pre-existing web content,
which is a company called Google,

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that a lot of people seem to
keep talking about.

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I twisted it around.

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So I made the internet revolve,

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just like the world rotates,
I guess.

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And then I made this other thing,
which is called the death of the URL,

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because the URLs died,
and this is one of the first things

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where it's actually a XXX domain name,
which was the first attempt to organize

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all the URLs so it would be easier to block
on porn content.

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But then I just.. yeah, you see what happens,
you know, that's happening.

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So I basically changed the title.

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Normally the referrer is..

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The referrer is actually in the title bar
as a URL, but now

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the title is actually in the page,
and ah.. yeah, you get it.

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Yeah, so that's.. or I would like an
encrypted treasure map

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and this treasure map is actually
weirdly enough sold

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for like a lot of money in New York
in an auction house just because

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it points to another treasure island,
where the fictive or maybe real treasure

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of Lima is buried and now there is an
actual exhibition buried.

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But.. and also I started a company
recently, DullTech,

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because I want technology to be more dull.

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*laughing*

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Because I think technology is perceived
to be exciting while it's not,

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so it should just be dull as fuck
as it is.

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Yeah.

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So..

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This is actually a..

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I also retrieved the very first image
that was ever photoshopped,

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which I was quite happy about finding.

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And then I decided to write an..
oh, actually I didn't put a timer.

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So anyway, I'll see notes.. ahm.

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So this is..

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I wrote a letter to her,
to the protagonist in this picture, Jennifer,

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and I'll read you the letter right now.

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Dear Jennifer, sometime in 1988,
through a sitting-in on the beach

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in Bora-Bora looking at to Opua island,
enjoying your holiday

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with a very serious boyfriend.

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The serious boyfriend, John,

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took a photograph of you sitting
on the beach not wearing your bikini top.

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John later became your husband
and father to your children

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Sara, Lisa, Alex and Jane.

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John, if you're watching this, hi.

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This photograph of a beautiful moment
in your personal history

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has also become a part of my history
and that of many other people.

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It has even shaped our outlooks
on the world at large.

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John's image of you became the very first
photograph to be publicly altered

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by the most influential image
manipulation program ever.

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Of course, this is why I know the names
of your children and this is also

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why I know you're trying to do cool things
trying to get a .green toplevel domain name.

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Anyway, personally I believe that the importance
of the domain name has been reduced

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to a nostalgic poetic value,
but that doesn't matter now.

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I still wonder if you felt the world
changed there on that beach,

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the fact that reality would be more moldable,
that normal people could change their history,

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brighten up their past and put
twirl effects on their faces.

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That holiday image became the very first
photograph publicly manipulated

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in Photoshop,
and your intimate beach moment

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became the reality for several
potential clients to play with.

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2 Jennifers, no Jennifer, less clouds etc.

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And in essence it was the
very first Photoshop meme.

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But now the image is nowhere
to be found online.

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Did John ask you if he could use
this particular image?

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Did you enjoy seeing yourself
on a screen as much as he did?

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Did you ever think you would be the muse
that would inspire so much contemporary

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image making?

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Did you ever print out the image yourself?

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Would you be willing to share
the image with me, and, if so,

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with the other people to whom it took
on such an unexpected significance?

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Shouldn't the Smithsonian or any other
large institution have the negative

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of that image, not to mention digital
backups of its endless variations?

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All these questions have made me decide
to redistribute the image, 'Jennifer in Paradise',

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as well as I can, somewhat as an artist,
somewhat as a digital archaeologist,

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restoring what few traces
of it I could find,

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restoring the image from what was available
to everyone in the somewhat public space

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of the internet.

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It was sad to realize this blurry screengrab
was the closest I could get to the image,

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but beautiful at the same time.

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How often do you find an important
image that is not online

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in several different sizes already?

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This beautiful artifact
of software development

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has become an artwork in this way,
in which you, or at least your depiction

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play a central part in a body of work
that has become very dear to me,

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a faint blurry pixelated focal point,

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a work that celebrates a time when
you were young and the world was young

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as it still naively believed in the
authenticity of the photograph.

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Sometimes, when I'm anxious about
the future of our surveilled

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computer-mediated world,

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when I worry about cultural imperialism
and the politics behind software design,

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I imagine myself travelling back in
time, just like the Terminator,

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to that important moment in technological
world history,

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there on that beach in Bora-Bora,
and just sit there with you,

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watching the tide roll away.

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Sincerly, Constant Dullaart.

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So, Jennifer never responded.

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Thank you.

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*laughing**applause*

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So, Jennifer never responded,
but the cool thing was..

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So this was basically an anecdote
in Adobe's history, right,

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so there was some talk about this
picture, but I couldn't find it online,

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and it was in a video which
I'll briefly show later.

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So, I restored it and I redistributed it
with this letter as an open letter.

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But of course I'm..

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I put a payload
in the jpg.

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I stuck in and graphically encrypted
some messages in different versions

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of this jpg because I also wanted
to discuss that a jpg, of course,

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isn't only a way to distribute images,
but it's also the container

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of the jpg, and especially if you
stuck in a graphically.. inject content,

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it actually becomes a unique container
discussing the thereoality (?) of

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digital photography besides, like..

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I mean, a lot of me.. as an artist,

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like I still have to do with a lot of people
discussing paper and discussing prints,

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and like discussing the value of a file,
if you can copy it and this kind of bullshit,

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and in the end, I needed to emphasize
the fact that like, this image also wasn't

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mine,

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I just redistributed it.

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So actually, the only thing that's for sale
as an artwork, as this, is the password

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to actually access the content
I injected into it.

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And then of course you get these questions
of institutions, like, how do we show this

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in a space?

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So this is, like, working predominantly online,

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this is the question I get most of the time.

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Constant, how do we show this
in your exhibition?

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So.. mostly I just take really stupid
analogies, and they work.

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So, here of course I used UV paint,
and I just, ah, the text,

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which is.. well.. maybe it's an image,
but the text that was encrypted

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in that Jennifer in Paradise image
is now painted with UV paint on there,

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and I would read it as a performance.

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And then, of course, because I
wanted to sell the passwords,

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I wanted the access to be the commodity,
right, so if you're.. like,

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within art you're always thinking about
a commodity, people wanna own something,

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they wanna have a cultural gesture,
which they can..

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yeah, which they can own, basically.

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And then, as an artist you're
entitled to do dramatic gestures.

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Or at least, I feel like I was entitled
to do dramatic gestures.

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*laughing*

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And to close down the access
to the encrypted contents

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I had to destroy..
*laughing*

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.. anyway, I don't advise
you doing that at home

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because apparently it's
poisonous or whatever..

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*laughing**applause*

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So this basically meant that the people..
*shouting from the audience*, *laughs*

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so this basically meant that the people
that wanted access to that content

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needed to, or buy new UV lights, or they
needed to buy the password to the file.

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The cool thing is that John,
after a while, did respond,

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because it was.. the Wall Street Journal
started to write about it,

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and the Wall Street Journal he did find
worthy to reply, not my, of course,

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my skanky little emails writing
the big developer.

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But anyway, he did reply,
and he was actually super-generous,

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and he was actually.. he was saying like,
you should have asked me,

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but he gave a lot of info, like
on which scanner he scanned

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that first image on, and
like he went to.. app,

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but he also said, like,
that he distributed it

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to other people under a strict
non-disclosure agreement,

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which I'll prove to you later that it's..
that that's.. not true.

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Anyway, but..

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I pointed out what is funny,
which is.. it says it's one of the first images

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to be photoshopped.

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I guess that is a word now.

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So, I'm really happy that I actually have
an email to prove the moment

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when the guy that made up 'photoshop'
figures out that 'photoshopping'

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had become a verb.

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*laughing*

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Anyway.. and also, like, he used
a 24-bits colour image.

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So, I don't know, any of you ever
using 24-bits colour images?

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I don't, but.. maybe you do.

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But the cool thing also that he
needed to transport the image

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on separate floppy disks to save
the red, green and blue channels,

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which I also thought was
quite remarkable.

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Anyway, of course.. like, this image
is really important because it was

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one of the first digital images
at that time for people to use

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manipulating in Photoshop,
because it's 1988,

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so there's no web, there's no
digital images distribution

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or wide availability of it,
no digital cameras,

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so they needed to find that
as a source.

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So this is the demo,actually,
where I got it from.

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John: So I start with it and open up..
constantdull: This is John

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John: an image of .. This is a tourist picture
I took of my wife when we were on a vacation

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in Tahiti.

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This is from Bora-Bora.

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I used this image for doing
a lot of the demonstrations

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including the first demonstrations
that I did at Adobe Systems.

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So I have opened a 24-bit image.

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We're looking at it on an 8-bit display,

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but you can still manipulate
the 24-bit image.

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So I'm gonna start by cloning Jennifer,
so I'm gonna start by just...

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constantdull: Okay, I'm just gonna mute
John out for a bit,

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because it's super interesting,
but you can watch the video later.

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The thing is that of course he's
cloning his wife,

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he asked her to marry her
the very next day after this picture.

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I'm just saying he's confirming
a very age-old cultural stigma

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of a man objectifying
the female body,

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and I thought that this was really..
*laughing*

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.. I mean the fact that he is
cloning his wife, and showing that

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as a tool to his potential customers..
*laughing*

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..seriously, what the fuck,
why didn't he use a bike,

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or a turtle or something.

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*laughing*

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John: Copy.. paste.

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*applause*

233
00:13:44,370 --> 00:13:49,580
John: And now I have a clone.

234
00:13:49,580 --> 00:13:51,210
constantdull: Anyway, so..

235
00:13:51,210 --> 00:13:52,870
I've been using
that image now because I felt

236
00:13:52,870 --> 00:13:56,310
like I'd made, you know,
a new perception of that copy,

237
00:13:56,310 --> 00:13:58,660
and I've been using that into
different works

238
00:13:58,660 --> 00:14:01,450
where I'm just rotating it through
all the different photoshop filters

239
00:14:01,450 --> 00:14:03,350
that are available.

240
00:14:03,350 --> 00:14:06,860
So you get these kind of images,
and you get like these.. little presentations

241
00:14:06,860 --> 00:14:09,480
where I like liquefy Jennifer
all over the place,

242
00:14:09,480 --> 00:14:12,730
like LitraAlt ?
You know, and there's all these

243
00:14:12,730 --> 00:14:16,710
like, images, because of course
I'm turning this image into

244
00:14:16,710 --> 00:14:18,890
a ubiquitous kind of image
that's everywhere.

245
00:14:18,890 --> 00:14:23,880
So I want to take it out of the idea
that it's not visible everywhere.

246
00:14:23,880 --> 00:14:27,540
But the cool thing is that finally then
John actually responded again,

247
00:14:27,540 --> 00:14:30,010
and that was in the Guardian,
and the cool thing is

248
00:14:30,010 --> 00:14:34,160
that, where before it was under
a so-called non-disclosure agreement,

249
00:14:34,160 --> 00:14:38,810
which actually my lawyer told me
that it's an implicit license he gave

250
00:14:38,810 --> 00:14:40,310
because he gave it to other people.

251
00:14:40,310 --> 00:14:44,520
Anyway, but the cool thing is that he
gave actually the real image

252
00:14:44,520 --> 00:14:46,110
to the Guardian.

253
00:14:46,110 --> 00:14:47,580
So now everybody has access

254
00:14:47,580 --> 00:14:49,910
to that first actual image.

255
00:14:49,910 --> 00:14:51,760
So I found like I still pride myself

256
00:14:51,760 --> 00:14:54,980
in kind of tricking him into
releasing that first image,

257
00:14:54,980 --> 00:14:57,160
where it was first like
a personal image,

258
00:14:57,160 --> 00:15:00,470
and now actually justified
to him that the world had

259
00:15:00,470 --> 00:15:04,140
a right to see that very first image
and to read that very first image

260
00:15:04,140 --> 00:15:07,850
as an important image in
photographic world history.

261
00:15:07,850 --> 00:15:10,870
So I'm kinda happy that this is
now available for everyone

262
00:15:10,870 --> 00:15:14,730
to fuck with.

263
00:15:14,730 --> 00:15:17,850
So, this is Jennifer now,
or about 3 years ago.

264
00:15:17,850 --> 00:15:19,890
She's.. yeah.

265
00:15:19,890 --> 00:15:20,890
This is her.

266
00:15:20,890 --> 00:15:22,780
I don't have anything to
say about this.

267
00:15:22,780 --> 00:15:25,440
*laughing*

268
00:15:25,440 --> 00:15:29,020
And also the nice thing is.. nonono,
also, I did want to like ask them..

269
00:15:29,020 --> 00:15:31,000
augh, 15 minutes, thank you.

270
00:15:31,000 --> 00:15:35,380
I also wanted to.. this means
I have to hurry up.

271
00:15:35,380 --> 00:15:38,680
I actually wanted to take them back
to Bora-Bora on like a holiday

272
00:15:38,680 --> 00:15:42,480
and retake that picture, right,
so.. and then they perceived it

273
00:15:42,480 --> 00:15:44,540
weirdly enough as an indecent proposal.

274
00:15:44,540 --> 00:15:46,720
They said, like, oh, nonono, that's not ok.

275
00:15:46,720 --> 00:15:49,220
And then I thought, like, maybe
they are prudes because she's like

276
00:15:49,220 --> 00:15:53,120
half naked in the picture and she thought
I would wanna see her naked again,

277
00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:54,970
which I never.. like, I thought of later.

278
00:15:54,970 --> 00:15:59,030
Anyway, but now, if you google her,
you get like the first response are..

279
00:15:59,030 --> 00:16:02,610
like, the first result is my letter to her,
which is still very nice,

280
00:16:02,610 --> 00:16:04,350
so I hope she read it by now.

281
00:16:04,350 --> 00:16:05,350
*laughing*

282
00:16:05,350 --> 00:16:09,180
But to be honest I only
conversed with her husband

283
00:16:09,180 --> 00:16:14,100
and she never replied which I
also think is a bit weird.

284
00:16:14,100 --> 00:16:17,330
Yeah, so.. *laughing* that.

285
00:16:17,330 --> 00:16:22,130
As an artist, I think I'm in the business
of turning this into like a more

286
00:16:22,130 --> 00:16:26,950
intricate version of this
and then calling it art.

287
00:16:26,950 --> 00:16:30,660
So, I was invited to do an
exhibition about clowns

288
00:16:30,660 --> 00:16:35,370
and I gave this press image,
and this is actually a..

289
00:16:35,370 --> 00:16:38,620
an artist, Marina Abramovic‡, that maybe
somebody would know,

290
00:16:38,620 --> 00:16:42,140
and it's Klaus Biesenbach, who is
like some kind of curator.

291
00:16:42,140 --> 00:16:44,910
And here is them with more curators.

292
00:16:44,910 --> 00:16:51,660
And here is Ai Weiwei
with naked children, which is awkward.

293
00:16:51,660 --> 00:16:55,730
Now, it's not.. it's not.. it's
a joke, it's a joke, sorry.

294
00:16:55,730 --> 00:17:00,880
So.. ok, I just have to
catch my breath.

295
00:17:00,880 --> 00:17:04,210
So, this is weird, right,
like now on Instagram,

296
00:17:04,210 --> 00:17:08,530
like, Instagram is actually
starting to influence

297
00:17:08,530 --> 00:17:10,690
how the artworld works.

298
00:17:10,690 --> 00:17:12,730
So you would see an artist,
you'd see the amount of followers.

299
00:17:12,730 --> 00:17:15,020
This is a collector, for example,
and you would see or be

300
00:17:15,020 --> 00:17:17,109
the circle of relevance (?).
Like, if they have a certain amounts

301
00:17:17,109 --> 00:17:22,200
of followers, you would think, like,
ok, that kind of quantitative validation,

302
00:17:22,200 --> 00:17:26,310
or like, this quantified social validation
might suggest the kind of access

303
00:17:26,310 --> 00:17:28,550
to like a social capital, s
that they're more

304
00:17:28,550 --> 00:17:31,170
relevant as a collector or as an artist.

305
00:17:31,170 --> 00:17:34,480
And like you'd get these collectors
that are posing in front of their artworks

306
00:17:34,480 --> 00:17:37,520
to generate more relevance
for their artworks.

307
00:17:37,520 --> 00:17:41,740
And in the end I was thinking,
if that relevance actually starts ..

308
00:17:41,740 --> 00:17:45,040
if that social capital, that quantification
of social capital actually starts

309
00:17:45,040 --> 00:17:47,730
to represent actual capital,
like in the art world,

310
00:17:47,730 --> 00:17:52,760
but in a lot of other places,
then why not buy that capital.

311
00:17:52,760 --> 00:17:55,230
And of course like, if you just do
a simple search online

312
00:17:55,230 --> 00:18:00,050
you can buy Facebook followers,
Instagram followers, everywhere.

313
00:18:00,050 --> 00:18:04,250
So... and then, I started to research
these followers,

314
00:18:04,250 --> 00:18:07,040
and these followers were all automated,
right, like, this was their content,

315
00:18:07,040 --> 00:18:08,740
this were the pictures they're posting.

316
00:18:08,740 --> 00:18:12,120
So you would get these like kinda
automated pictures where it says..

317
00:18:12,120 --> 00:18:17,580
this has the hashtag 'instadroid',
but weirdly cropped-off heads

318
00:18:17,580 --> 00:18:19,430
in the image.

319
00:18:19,430 --> 00:18:23,830
This also..
reminiscence with weirdly cropped-off heads

320
00:18:23,830 --> 00:18:24,830
in the image.

321
00:18:24,830 --> 00:18:28,120
And of course, this means
it's just an automatically cropped image

322
00:18:28,120 --> 00:18:36,240
because of the at that time dominant-square
format of instagram pictures.

323
00:18:36,240 --> 00:18:39,340
So, the tag is 'relax' with another few
heads missing.

324
00:18:39,340 --> 00:18:40,790
'Marathon'..

325
00:18:40,790 --> 00:18:43,050
I never knew you could do
a marathon with a snowboard,

326
00:18:43,050 --> 00:18:44,050
but, whatever.

327
00:18:44,050 --> 00:18:46,900
So.. *laughing*
this is all, like, generated, right,

328
00:18:46,900 --> 00:18:49,720
and then you even have the bios,
the bios are ripped from other people

329
00:18:49,720 --> 00:18:50,980
and then manipulated.

330
00:18:50,980 --> 00:18:52,970
So maybe a lot of you people
would know this already,

331
00:18:52,970 --> 00:18:57,700
but I thought it was really, like,
genuinely awesome poetry,

332
00:18:57,700 --> 00:19:01,940
or found poetry, where..
this is Jonalan, and Jonalan says

333
00:19:01,940 --> 00:19:10,550
":) I'll prove to the world that I would ecome
somehin imporant to they ned someday."

334
00:19:10,550 --> 00:19:13,880
So I think thats..
and Darsed says "I love so much asteniber."

335
00:19:13,880 --> 00:19:16,800
*laughing*

336
00:19:16,800 --> 00:19:23,090
And.. anyway, I'll skip this, or..
"simple n pretty n paid"

337
00:19:23,090 --> 00:19:24,090
This is also weird.

338
00:19:24,090 --> 00:19:29,210
Gondar is
"mchanical engineer 29 years old, raduated

339
00:19:29,210 --> 00:19:32,060
from ITM in 2007"

340
00:19:32,060 --> 00:19:36,920
I think the original bio reads MIT,
but I'm not sure.

341
00:19:36,920 --> 00:19:39,480
And this is one of my favourites,
where it says:

342
00:19:39,480 --> 00:19:42,200
"Myna isRoxi, I like it be fancy."

343
00:19:42,200 --> 00:19:45,480
*laughing*

344
00:19:45,480 --> 00:19:49,380
"phot, vieo hort poems blogger,
web edditing"

345
00:19:49,380 --> 00:19:53,100
Anyway, so this is another artist,
maybe you know him, Jeff Koons,

346
00:19:53,100 --> 00:19:56,940
he was also fresh on Instagram,
and you know what I did,

347
00:19:56,940 --> 00:20:04,560
I thought like if I can buy these followers,
you know, if I can find Jeff Koons,

348
00:20:04,560 --> 00:20:08,170
why not actually inject some capital
into these people and inject

349
00:20:08,170 --> 00:20:13,410
some social capital, and I decided to buy
2.5 million instagram followers.

350
00:20:13,410 --> 00:20:14,920
*laughing*

351
00:20:14,920 --> 00:20:18,750
Because I had a budget from some
institution and I donated these.. *laughing*

352
00:20:18,750 --> 00:20:21,660
I donated these followers to
all these artists, right,

353
00:20:21,660 --> 00:20:25,850
because if these artists wanna
kind of compare length of their dicks,

354
00:20:25,850 --> 00:20:30,460
to like follower numbers, then why not
make them all as equal?

355
00:20:30,460 --> 00:20:40,040
*laughing* So..
*applause*

356
00:20:40,040 --> 00:20:41,040
Thank you.

357
00:20:41,040 --> 00:20:43,130
So Jeff Koons had 100,000 followers.

358
00:20:43,130 --> 00:20:46,870
Jerry Saltz who is a critic
also got 100,000 followers.

359
00:20:46,870 --> 00:20:49,870
Klaus Biesenbach got 100,000 followers.

360
00:20:49,870 --> 00:20:53,170
Richard Prince got 100,000 followers.

361
00:20:53,170 --> 00:20:55,000
This Murakami got 100,000 followers.

362
00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:57,900
Jonas Lund, a friend of mine,
got 100,000 followers.

363
00:20:57,900 --> 00:21:02,980
All these people got 100,000 followers
exactly, so they were equal to each other.

364
00:21:02,980 --> 00:21:11,940
*laughingwhoopingclapping*

365
00:21:11,940 --> 00:21:16,820
So basically I became the Lenin
of social media, right?

366
00:21:16,820 --> 00:21:18,980
*laughing*

367
00:21:18,980 --> 00:21:23,060
Injecting capital making people
equal is what I do.

368
00:21:23,060 --> 00:21:27,740
So.. this is.. but the weird thing was
that the New York Times called me

369
00:21:27,740 --> 00:21:32,200
and I'm like, holy fuck, NYT is calling me,
it's on the phone, on this shitty little

370
00:21:32,200 --> 00:21:34,990
freephone, or fairphone, like on..
audience: Yeah!

371
00:21:34,990 --> 00:21:37,920
Heh, exactly, fairphone.. *laughing*
there's the New York Times, right.

372
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:40,690
So I'm thinking, this is relevant.

373
00:21:40,690 --> 00:21:41,700
And she keeps asking me

374
00:21:41,700 --> 00:21:45,180
- I'm hurrying up -, like,
she's asking me, like, yeah, but like,

375
00:21:45,180 --> 00:21:48,050
do you know other people that are
selling artworks for Instagram,

376
00:21:48,050 --> 00:21:51,170
and like, did you make money
for Instagram, and I'm like,

377
00:21:51,170 --> 00:21:54,820
that's.. like, what I'm criticizing, like,
this is not what the work is about, like,

378
00:21:54,820 --> 00:21:57,530
I'm not actually telling you like
maybe somebody won't spot

379
00:21:57,530 --> 00:22:01,520
a work of mine through Instagram,
but that's, like, I'm saying, like this..

380
00:22:01,520 --> 00:22:05,850
validation system of you thinking
an artwork is important is corrupt.

381
00:22:05,850 --> 00:22:06,950
It's vulnerable.

382
00:22:06,950 --> 00:22:09,430
It's a system that's
fucked, and it's a commercial system

383
00:22:09,430 --> 00:22:12,130
that we're buying into and you
shouldn't believe it.

384
00:22:12,130 --> 00:22:15,690
So the funny thing was that
in this article she quoted Simon de Pury

385
00:22:15,690 --> 00:22:19,810
as an auctioneer and she quoted
his follower number to mention

386
00:22:19,810 --> 00:22:21,670
how important he was.

387
00:22:21,670 --> 00:22:22,670
*laughing*

388
00:22:22,670 --> 00:22:25,300
But I bought that guy..

389
00:22:25,300 --> 00:22:28,080
I bought that motherfucker,
like, how many followers?

390
00:22:28,080 --> 00:22:31,200
*laughing*
25,000 followers, so why the fuck

391
00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:35,120
did the New York Times quote, you know,
that actual number to inject..

392
00:22:35,120 --> 00:22:38,110
like, to mention some kind of
relevance for that auctioneer.

393
00:22:38,110 --> 00:22:42,490
The same with Ai Weiwei, they also quoted
like how many followers they had,

394
00:22:42,490 --> 00:22:44,900
like, I own these followers.

395
00:22:44,900 --> 00:22:47,220
*laughing*

396
00:22:47,220 --> 00:22:51,470
Anyway, so we're in a world..
we're in a world that these kind of images,

397
00:22:51,470 --> 00:22:54,770
this is the most-liked image,
that this is gonna be our culture.

398
00:22:54,770 --> 00:22:59,180
That this is gonna be the most relevant
image, because this is the most liked.

399
00:22:59,180 --> 00:23:00,850
And that's a shitty place to be.

400
00:23:00,850 --> 00:23:01,850
You know.

401
00:23:01,850 --> 00:23:02,850
We need to have

402
00:23:02,850 --> 00:23:06,010
other tools to talk about the value
of images, to talk about our culture,

403
00:23:06,010 --> 00:23:08,590
and not get trapped into these stigmas.

404
00:23:08,590 --> 00:23:13,400
So as an artist we need other tools
to just make, you know, reversed thumbs,

405
00:23:13,400 --> 00:23:16,020
we need another way to reflect
on that landscape.

406
00:23:16,020 --> 00:23:17,350
So then you have..

407
00:23:17,350 --> 00:23:20,530
I'm not gonna explain
technically, but you..

408
00:23:20,530 --> 00:23:21,540
*laughing*

409
00:23:21,540 --> 00:23:26,130
So, Friend Bomber, Mass Planner,
all these little things, and I got information

410
00:23:26,130 --> 00:23:29,560
because I was asked for the..

411
00:23:29,560 --> 00:23:34,800
I was asked for Schirn, Kunsthalle Frankfurt,

412
00:23:34,800 --> 00:23:38,350
to do another project, and they gave
me some money, and Schirn Frankfurt

413
00:23:38,350 --> 00:23:40,050
is based in Hessen.

414
00:23:40,050 --> 00:23:44,590
And Hessen delivered the soldiers to
fight the first American revolution.

415
00:23:44,590 --> 00:23:47,640
So I thought it would be more than
fitting to bring them back to life

416
00:23:47,640 --> 00:23:49,820
and fight this American revolution.

417
00:23:49,820 --> 00:23:50,980
So I took all the names from

418
00:23:50,980 --> 00:23:54,970
the actual Hessian soldiers that fought
in the United States, were paid by the British,

419
00:23:54,970 --> 00:23:59,250
and actually with that money the very first
contemporary art museum was funded,

420
00:23:59,250 --> 00:24:01,550
the Fridericianum.

421
00:24:01,550 --> 00:24:04,510
Anyway, 1780,
all these names I got through

422
00:24:04,510 --> 00:24:08,820
the wonderful Landesgeschichte
information system, but also the professor

423
00:24:08,820 --> 00:24:10,309
that helped me.

424
00:24:10,309 --> 00:24:15,830
So, these are all the accounts
that I made active.

425
00:24:15,830 --> 00:24:18,850
*laughing*

426
00:24:18,850 --> 00:24:23,410
But the weird thing was that all these accounts,
like, a lot of these were created in Pakistan,

427
00:24:23,410 --> 00:24:26,940
also, they were actually manually crafted,
also, I had like automated ones,

428
00:24:26,940 --> 00:24:31,400
but also tried.. this guy.. have manually
crafted ones.

429
00:24:31,400 --> 00:24:34,640
And then these pictures showed up,
and I actually had to explain them,

430
00:24:34,640 --> 00:24:40,750
like, the Hessian soldiers were white,
and like I shouldn't have like non-white.

431
00:24:40,750 --> 00:24:43,830
like, passport pictures on there.

432
00:24:43,830 --> 00:24:46,270
And then, when.. but then actually,

433
00:24:46,270 --> 00:24:49,020
when I was typing this in Skype,
weirdly enough all these people

434
00:24:49,020 --> 00:24:53,150
use Skype, which I thought was very weird,
knowing what we know,

435
00:24:53,150 --> 00:24:56,350
but anyway, it felt so weird to ask that
and say, like, could you please

436
00:24:56,350 --> 00:24:59,700
use white images, that
I'd stopped asking that.

437
00:24:59,700 --> 00:25:03,710
So, if somebody talks to me
about, like, the conceptual error,

438
00:25:03,710 --> 00:25:09,010
why the artificial army isn't all white,
it's because I don't give a fuck anymore,

439
00:25:09,010 --> 00:25:15,150
and I don't wanna ask somebody in Pakistan
to only use white images, cause it's fucked.

440
00:25:15,150 --> 00:25:17,130
*applause*

441
00:25:17,130 --> 00:25:21,910
Anyway, so of course because it's..
thank you.

442
00:25:21,910 --> 00:25:24,310
Because it's also of course like,
it's very weird that we're using this

443
00:25:24,310 --> 00:25:29,510
kind of like system where it's like...
a lot of this kind of artificial capital,

444
00:25:29,510 --> 00:25:34,290
of this artificial social capital is crafted
in lower wage countries,

445
00:25:34,290 --> 00:25:36,880
and we're actually supporting a system
by buying these followers

446
00:25:36,880 --> 00:25:43,400
and buying this kind of black hat SEO shit,
with like having a very large groups of people

447
00:25:43,400 --> 00:25:48,850
crafting this kind of.. these kind of accounts,
and.. anyway, I think there's ..

448
00:25:48,850 --> 00:25:52,250
a kind of messy thing, but the nice thing
about like using army as an analogy

449
00:25:52,250 --> 00:25:56,110
is that it brought me onto BBC News.

450
00:25:56,110 --> 00:25:58,290
And this is also really funny,
because I think this is again

451
00:25:58,290 --> 00:25:59,360
like the value of..

452
00:25:59,360 --> 00:26:01,850
I could've said, like, I make a..

453
00:26:01,850 --> 00:26:05,250
like a large collection of
phone verified accounts,

454
00:26:05,250 --> 00:26:09,800
but I think by saying I made
a fake army, or I made an army,

455
00:26:09,800 --> 00:26:12,270
got me on the news and then
the funny thing is that actually

456
00:26:12,270 --> 00:26:16,520
although it's been on the news
and in the Guardian again,

457
00:26:16,520 --> 00:26:21,580
the nice thing is over half of
the army is still alive.

458
00:26:21,580 --> 00:26:25,760
So they're still out there, I'm still
distributing likes,

459
00:26:25,760 --> 00:26:26,870
I'm still using that.

460
00:26:26,870 --> 00:26:28,110
If you would want to help me,

461
00:26:28,110 --> 00:26:30,750
please give me.. if you have like
spare Facebook accounts,

462
00:26:30,750 --> 00:26:34,140
which I hope you don't,
if you do, fuck Facebook,

463
00:26:34,140 --> 00:26:39,700
get the fuck out of there,
but also, if you do have them,

464
00:26:39,700 --> 00:26:44,060
give them to me and please accept
the friends of like another 1000 soldiers

465
00:26:44,060 --> 00:26:46,930
and the next few thousand soldiers
that I'm gonna make,

466
00:26:46,930 --> 00:26:49,180
and let's create some social noise.

467
00:26:49,180 --> 00:26:52,231
Let's create some social noise
of like.. and fight this kind of

468
00:26:52,231 --> 00:26:56,750
weird artificial system of like
quality validation through..

469
00:26:56,750 --> 00:27:01,580
through this kind of artificial social
measurement system.

470
00:27:01,580 --> 00:27:04,309
So yeah, like.. fuck Facebook.

471
00:27:04,309 --> 00:27:10,100
Anyway, I'll just play with a short piece
of.. is that a zero or do I have like

472
00:27:10,100 --> 00:27:11,680
a few more minutes left?

473
00:27:11,680 --> 00:27:12,680
Ok.

474
00:27:12,680 --> 00:27:15,420
So I'll play a short.. a brief part

475
00:27:15,420 --> 00:27:19,630
of my video would like..
my call to war, let's say.

476
00:27:19,630 --> 00:27:24,410
*phone ringing*
This is not a part of the video.

477
00:27:24,410 --> 00:27:25,620
*laughing*

478
00:27:25,620 --> 00:27:29,520
[voice] Hi and welcome to our tutorial.

479
00:27:29,520 --> 00:27:34,170
[voice] In this video, we will show you how
to create identities through the quick star

480
00:27:34,170 --> 00:27:39,780
wizard.

481
00:27:39,780 --> 00:27:56,640
*trumpet playing*, *yelling*

482
00:27:56,640 --> 00:28:32,850
*energetic brass instrumental music*

483
00:28:32,850 --> 00:28:35,890
*applause*

484
00:28:35,890 --> 00:28:37,790
constantdull: Yeah, thank you very much.

485
00:28:37,790 --> 00:28:44,750
*applause*

486
00:28:44,750 --> 00:28:51,180
So, yeah, if there's questions, I would just
like to say, at the end of the project

487
00:28:51,180 --> 00:28:53,160
I'll also release like a..
of course, like the

488
00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:54,910
cool little graphs that you see

489
00:28:54,910 --> 00:28:59,800
when you hit the BBC how many profiles
were deleted by Facebook, and how,

490
00:28:59,800 --> 00:29:05,090
and like.. and you'll see like how many
little like attacks sparked which..

491
00:29:05,090 --> 00:29:07,480
how many deletions,
and these kind of things.

492
00:29:07,480 --> 00:29:13,380
But, again, if you could help me
have these fake identities

493
00:29:13,380 --> 00:29:17,040
infiltrate the real world with the
real identities and let them

494
00:29:17,040 --> 00:29:20,040
mash up together, I would be
very grateful for this project.

495
00:29:20,040 --> 00:29:25,130
Herald: I would also like to boost up
my Instagram, my Twitter, my Facebook too.

496
00:29:25,130 --> 00:29:27,610
constantdull: Oh, you want more followers?
Herald: Yeah!

497
00:29:27,610 --> 00:29:28,460
constantdull: Oh yeah, ok.
Herald: Please.

498
00:29:28,460 --> 00:29:29,460
10,000..

499
00:29:29,460 --> 00:29:30,460
constantdull: I get that a lot.

500
00:29:30,460 --> 00:29:32,790
Herald: Are we not friends?
100.000

501
00:29:32,790 --> 00:29:33,610
*audience laughing*

502
00:29:33,610 --> 00:29:36,200
*laughs* Thank you so much
for the super-interesting talk.

503
00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:42,580
We.. I think we time for 2 questions,
or even 1 question from..

504
00:29:42,580 --> 00:29:45,880
constantdull: Oh, but there's a big..
there's a big no on that.

505
00:29:45,880 --> 00:29:47,260
constantdull: I'm..
Herald: No.

506
00:29:47,260 --> 00:29:48,260
No.

507
00:29:48,260 --> 00:29:51,429
So.. yeah, actually..
if there's any questions then I think

508
00:29:51,429 --> 00:29:54,690
we can do that outside of the talk right now.

509
00:29:54,690 --> 00:29:55,930
Thank you very much!

510
00:29:55,930 --> 00:29:57,660
constantdull: Thank you!
*applause*

511
00:29:57,660 --> 00:30:08,521
*postroll music*